Virtual Social Shopping _ Zhou,Yijun _BFA INT
What would happen if the social aspects were introduced into conventional online shopping experience? Imagining KITH as a multi-users based online virtual store for customizable fashion goods within the digitally reproduced Scholastic Building in Soho, I compose my thesis as a satire to present and examine the interiors of e-commerce retailer and aims to educate my users of how shopping reinforced social differentiations.
Curatorial View_Zhou,Yijun
By Virtual Social Shopping _ Zhou,Yijun _BFA INT
Site&Program_Zhou,Yijun
By Virtual Social Shopping _ Zhou,Yijun _BFA INT
Exploded Axonometric_Zhou,Yijun
By Virtual Social Shopping _ Zhou,Yijun _BFA INT
Ground Floor_Zhou,Yijun
By Virtual Social Shopping _ Zhou,Yijun _BFA INT
Activewear Floor_Zhou,Yijun
By Virtual Social Shopping _ Zhou,Yijun _BFA INT
Streetwear Floor_Zhou,Yijun
By Virtual Social Shopping _ Zhou,Yijun _BFA INT
Premier Exclusive Floor_Zhou,Yijun
By Virtual Social Shopping _ Zhou,Yijun _BFA INT
Sectional Diagram and Virtual Material_Zhou,Yijun
By Virtual Social Shopping _ Zhou,Yijun _BFA INT
Curatorial Section Perspective_Zhou,Yijun
By Virtual Social Shopping _ Zhou,Yijun _BFA INT
Experience:Entry_Zhou,Yijun
By Virtual Social Shopping _ Zhou,Yijun _BFA INT
Experience:Footwear_Zhou,Yijun
By Virtual Social Shopping _ Zhou,Yijun _BFA INT
Experience:Streetwear_Zhou,Yijun
By Virtual Social Shopping _ Zhou,Yijun _BFA INT
Experience:Premier User_Zhou,Yijun
By Virtual Social Shopping _ Zhou,Yijun _BFA INT
Experience:CustomizingBackground_Zhou,Yijun
By Virtual Social Shopping _ Zhou,Yijun _BFA INT
Customization Snapshot Posts on Social Media_Image18
By Virtual Social Shopping _ Zhou,Yijun _BFA INT
Concept Development_Zhou,Yijun
By Virtual Social Shopping _ Zhou,Yijun _BFA INT
Program and Users Distribution_Zhou,Yijun
By Virtual Social Shopping _ Zhou,Yijun _BFA INT
Product Display Case Design_Zhou,Yijun
By Virtual Social Shopping _ Zhou,Yijun _BFA INT
Thesis Book & Thesis Research & Interior Design Portfolio & Graphic Design Portfolio
Artist Statement
As a soon to be graduated interior design student from Pratt Institute with a cumulative GPA of 3.79, I always find it exciting to translate abstract conceptual ideas into design languages and adapt them into space program planning. Skilled in AutoCAD drafting, Rhino modeling, Keyshot rendering, I enjoy more with hand sketching and modeling. I am extremely
excited to bring my expertise and enthusiasm and devote myself to the industry!
Thesis Statement
What would happen if the social aspects were introduced into conventional online shopping experience? Imagining KITH as a multi-users based online virtual store for customizable fashion goods within the digitally reproduced Scholastic Building in Soho, I compose my thesis as a satire to present and examine the interiors of e-commerce retailer and aims to educate my users of how shopping reinforced social differentiations.
Georg Simmel, in his 1908 essay “Fashion,” points out that fashion goods satisfy human’s dualistic nature via providing apertures that allow people to be generalized into groups with similar tendencies, and at the same time showcases one’s uniqueness that different one from the others. Mass customization satisfies these drives- identical in form and structure, different through customizable color schemes – each item is both the same and different.
I intend to explore such a topic by developing a multi-users based online platform. A similar idea is explored in a virtual platform “Second Life,” which informs my project’s method and medium. The site is the virtual Scholastic Building in Soho, reproduced digitally, experienced virtually, and inhabited by avatars selected and customized by the user. The recreation of a physical place and context parallels the actual product from online shopping and the social atmosphere experienced in physical stores.
My program is a virtual online shopping platform for customizable fashion apparel. The idea of customization strengthens Georg Simmel’s fashion theory, in which fashion provides solutions to both be generalized and special at the same time. A similar program was observed at Converse Flagship Store in Soho. In my visit, I found the representation form of customized products is a crucial factor in the shopping experience. Coming out of the consideration of fashion’s social influence, I decided KITH as my client for its brand identity and story.
By working with this site, program, and client, I hope to form a thorough virtual retail scenario that also serves as a satire, presenting both positive and negative sides of fashion’s social aspects and bringing users’ awareness of the internet’s surveillance and control as a sales platform.
Referring to Georg Simmel’s humans seek two antagonistic psychological tendencies – being the same and different at the same time. By introducing publicity into the customization process, users are designed to experience similarities and differentiation by comparing with others. As a satire, the publicity is also designed to evoke users’ awareness of the internet as a tool of surveillance and control. Always seeing and being seen by other users serve the idea of surveillance. Limited selections for every customizable element are designed to criticize that online retailers create illusions of control to the users as a way of marketing. Fashion’s weaponization will be rendered as classifying users into different shopping groups based on paid or unpaid membership. The exclusiveness of separated shopping and customizing areas will divide users into different groups to reflect Simmel’s idea of fashion has always been used as a method for the fashion elite to differentiate themselves from the others.
Virtual Shopping Experience_Select Avatar
Virtual Shopping Experience_Activewear Department
Virtual Shopping Experience_Streetwear Department
Virtual Shopping Experience_Premier User
Overall Virtual Shopping Experience
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